Morning came. It was fairly early when Emma got woken up. Lilly was making some noises as she was doing something next to the pole. Emma quickly grabbed her bow and aimed it at Lucas, thinking he had gotten free. After having her bow aimed at him for a couple of seconds, she would realize that he was still tied up and see Lilly sitting there. Lilly was busy with the food that he had gotten them but she was being picky about the food. While Emma had been sleeping, Lilly decided to get clothed and to look at the food he had gotten them. It was a disgusting but edible bread and jerky. A meal that royals like they would never eat. Lilly gave Emma a piece of dry bread with a piece of jerky on it.
Emma took the food and then looked at her as if she was making a joke, putting it down onto the bed. “Isn’t there anything better?”
Lilly shook her head as she was chewing on some jerky, gesturing to a pile of clothes next to Emma. Apparently Lilly had decided to choose who of them wore what. Emma took the clothes but then looked back at the food. “Anything? I’ll eat anything but this.”
This cause Lilly to look up at her, swallowing her food and sighing. “Just get dressed.”
The clothes they had were almost identical. The pants were some tight pants that made traveling more easy although they didn’t fit well for them, causing them to be sagging a bit. Lilly was wearing a brown shirt while Emma got a green shirt. Lucas never needed things like a bra so unfortunately for them that wasn’t on the menu. The underwear as well was too big for them but hey, they were clothed now.
Even though she didn’t want it, Emma started to eat. While she ate, she looked at Lucas who was still sitting against the pole. He didn’t say any mean comment nor did he really move. “Is he dead?”
It stayed silent for a bit as Lilly looked at him for a bit, not sure about it. Lucas didn’t move for five more seconds or so before slowly turning his head to where the voice of Emma had come from.
“Yes I’m dead.” He sounded annoyed and mad when saying it which wasn’t unjustified.
This made Lilly smile. “That’s a shame. Although if you’re dead than we don’t need to kill you.”
Emma watched as they talked, grabbing the jerky of the bread as she wasn’t going to eat that disgusting bread anymore.
“Could I at least eat as well?” As he said that, his stomach started to growl.
Even though Emma and Lilly had him under their full control, Emma couldn’t help it but to drive the knife deeper. “Off course you can, if you beg for it.”
As they talked, Lilly looked at them being rather amused by this conversation, standing up and leaning against the other side of the pole.
“Begging for my own food. What is happening with my life?” Asked Lucas more to himself then to them.
“People like you should be happy that royal blood like us is eating your food.” Was Lilly’s reply. She sounded like she was talking to another high ranking royal, using a nice and fancy voice as she looked at Lucas. “You should be honored to be taken down by royals.”
This didn’t really make things much better, causing Lucas to talk softly and to himself so that only Lilly heard it. “People like you should get a good spanking in order to learn to respect other creatures and not only other royals. You’re what’s wrong with most leading powers.”
Due to Emma not hearing it, she would sit up and looked down at him. “What was that?”
“What’s your plan anyway? Keeping me tied up in here until you’re found?”
Seeing that Emma didn’t hear what he said first, she was satisfied. Lilly saw this and chuckled a bit, trying to hide it. “We’re going back to our Gruge. We need to warn our dad that the Forest Gruge is hostile.”
Lucas turned his head away as he thought about it. “That doesn’t sound right. What makes you say that? Just because one group kills doesn’t meant that they’re all bad.”
“Well, bad or not we still need to get back.” Replied Emma as she put the rest of her jerky away. It tasted too salty and she hated it.
“So… going back to your own land. How will you do that all on your own?”
“We’re not alone. We have you to get us there. I would suspect that you know these lands better than us so…”
Lucas laughed a bit before shaking his head. “You can’t trust me and neither can I trust you. I’m your prisoner so why would I help you? I don’t even understand why you don’t trust me.”
“Because your story is completely bullshit. Coming from another planet, give us a break.” Emma sounded a bit upset saying that as she was getting tired of the conversation, being grumpy about the lack of actual good food.
“Does it matter if my story is real or not? I brought you clothes and food. How can I be bad? I didn’t even try to kill you, just trying to stay free and escape.”
Emma and Lily looked at each other as they thought about it for a second. Lily then just nodded, feeling defeated. Emma looked at him an back to Lilly, watching her untie him. As soon as he was untied, he got up and pulled the blindfold off, throwing it away. He quickly opened his backpack as he backed off. These sudden movements were alarming to the girls. They grabbed their bows and aimed it at his head, ready to kill. Lucas looked at them calmer then they would think he’d be after being threatened. He had taken some jerky out of his bag, starting to chew on it. His stomach growling as he was very hungry. They lowered their bows, seemingly starting to relax.
“You look like a starved animal.” Joked Lilly as she put her bow back on the bed.
This coughed Lucas’s attention, looking at the bow which was previously his. “Can I get my bow back?”
“No” Lilly smiled when saying this, looking at him as if she was challenging him to try and take it from her. He would shrug and continue to eat. “Meh… I’m not that good with it anyway.” He continued to eat, grabbing the rest of the bread as they didn’t seem to eat it. He then again grabbed his bag and took the map out, throwing it to Lily. “Here, read it and point where you have to go.”
As they grabbed the map and opened it up, Lucas finally god a good look at the both of them. The clothes were too big for the both of them although that affected Lilly less than Emma. Lilly had a bit more of a stomach, fitting better in the shirt than her sister. Outside from that, he also noticed that Emma liked to have long hair while Lilly had shorter hair. Both still had brown hair which made it more clear that they were twins. His thoughts got cut off when Lilly rolled the map back up, throwing it back at him.
“Your map sucks Lucas. It’s too small and terribly drawn. Even I can do it better.”
This made him sigh and stuff the map in his bag as he looked defeated. “Okay listen, if you want me to help you two then you really need to get off your high horses and stop insulting me. Yes you managed to take me down, congrats.”
Neither of the girls seemed to feel bad about their actions, giving each other evil grins as they then looked back at him, waiting for a solution.
“Okay then… seems like we need to get a bigger map. I know someone special who has a bigger map. She does live a good distance away from here so we better leave soon.” He glanced at the entrance to see how high the sun was at this point.
Emma looked at his face as she heard what he had said. “Someone special? Does that mean… someone you love…?”
That made him look at her with anger at first which then quickly turned into a look that almost seemed to represent sadness. “Love… don’t talk to me about love. And no, I don’t love her.”
Both of the girls laughed as they looked at him. “Oh you do like her, don’t deny it.” Said Lilly, joining in with the fun of teasing Lucas.
He would put his backpack on as he walked to the exit. “You’ll see what I mean. Now come and follow me, we’ll walk next to the river. The only problem with that is that there’s no way to escape if anyone decides to attack us. The river flows too fast to be able to swim in it properly but I don’t think that we have much choice. Does anyone have a problem with that?” He seemed to be done with the conversation and the constant teasing.
Neither of the girls answered as they hadn’t any alternate plan that they could fall back on. Both of them got up and followed him out the tree. As they got out and looked around, Lucas seemed to be missing. For some reason, nobody had shown up yet to check on the horse. Lilly being out the first would be a bit concerned about Lucas his disappearance. She and Emma both had their bows which Lilly ordered her sister to draw and to get ready.
“Something’s not right. Where is Lucas?”
As they both got ready for the inevitable fight, something dropped right next to them, making them jump and back off. It were 2 more bags filled up with something. Looking up, they saw Lucas starting to climb down as he had yet another bag strapped to his back above the first bag.
Once on the ground again, Lilly would let out a sigh of relief. “That gave us a scare. What is in the bags?”
“Tent, food, and food.” He pointed at the bag on his back which obviously had poles showing it being a tent as he then gestured to the others who supposedly had food. “You two carry those.”
This made the girls laugh, looking at each other. “How about no?” Said Lilly as she didn’t think that people like her and her sister had to work.
Lucas just looked at them for a second before turning around and walking away from them. This caused Emma and Lilly to quickly follow him, not bringing the bags. Lucas wasn’t planning on leaving though, going to what looked like a small grave.
It wasn’t much really, being a patch on the ground where the dirt was higher than on the other places with two stone on top of each other at one end. Lucas got quiet for a second as the sisters looked at him confused for a bit.
“Thank you Frank. Without you I wouldn’t have been here. But I have to go now for a while so could you keep the house safe for me? Thank you.” He put down an amulet on the top stone, standing back up and walking away from the tree to start the journey, going in the opposite direction of the ravine.
“Who is Frank?” Asked Emma while Lily just followed and didn’t do anything.
Lucas ignored the question as he once again didn’t seem to be wanting to talk.
Emma grabbed his arm, not letting go. “Who is Frank? Your father?”
Lucas seemed to have enough of them. They had been talking down to him constantly, tied him down and continued to make fun of him. “Don’t talk about my father! He was an asshole who didn’t care for me! As for a mother…? I don’t have one! Frank was the dead person I found in the home before I decided to live in it.” He said that last part more quiet.
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Seeing his outburst, the girls seemed a bit hesitant to ask any questions. Lilly seeing that perhaps they have gone too far would try to ask what both her and her sister were asking themselves. “Then why do you talk to him like that?”
“I was lonely. Like I said, I was in a foreign world and I didn’t know anyone so I need to make due with what I had and I had Frank. Now let’s go, I want to make a bit of distance as I’m not sure how far we’ll get at this point.” He looked up at them and then behind them. “And don’t forget the bags or we won’t eat.”
The mention of not eating was a good way of getting them to move, both of them quickly going back to bags to grab them. When they had put them on and turned to look at him, he would already be on his way. They ran after him, not wanting to get lost. Seeing what had been sad, neither of the sisters decided to talk right now, letting Lucas stew for a bit.
After walking for around half an hour, both Lilly and Emma started to become trouble for Lucas once more. Emme seemed to be on the edge of asking more question which Lucas showed to be not a fan off while Lilly was huffing and trying to keep up with them. Even though Lucas had a tent on his back, Lilly with her extra body weight even though it wasn’t that much more still was out of shape.
Lilly once more started to run again, getting next to Lucas. “S-So… When will we take a break? I’m feel a bit tired.”
Lucas looked up at her as he then looked up at the sky, mumbling something before looking at her. “We’re not even at the river. We can’t stop now as they will come back to check the ravine soon. The reason I think they haven’t done that yet is because they have looked around the area where they caught your horse. With a bit of luck it was far away. But I doubt it’ll take them long to come back.”
Emma hesitated as she looked at the ground. “I could use some rest as well…”
Lucas suddenly stopped and dropped his backpack and the tent, sitting down as he looked at them. “Fine, five minutes. Take them while you can because I’m not staying any longer.”
Lilly let out a sigh as she walked to a fallen down tree, sitting down on the side and dropping the backpack. Emma watched her before turning to Lucas, starting to ask the questions she was brooding on.
“You said that you didn’t have a mother. How did she die?”
Trying to get comfortable, he would grab his bag and opened it up, taking out the small crossbow. He had been extremely lucky that it didn’t break after he dropped the tent on it.
“When I said that I don’t have a mother, I meant that I never had a mother to begin with. I wasn’t born in the traditional way.”
Emma looked at the crossbow, being very interested in what it was. It had a leather strap at the bottom which Lucas used to attach it to his wrist and then loaded with the tiny bolt.
“You really aren’t from this planet are you? How did you come to be?”
Even though Lucas didn’t like talking to the princesses, he also realized that he actually never had talked to anyone about his past. “Well… I don’t know to be sure. I guess that I was… invented?” He didn’t look at her when he talked about his past, letting his sleeve go over the crossbow.
Seeing as Lucas didn’t look at her while he talked, she would sit down in front of him. “Okay… then what about your father? Who is he?”
“My father is God. And I’ve heard about the God of this world and no he’s not my father.” He pulled back the string of the crossbow to try it out.
“Then how did you end up here? You never explained that.”
Even though he had armed the crossbow, he didn’t want to shoot it, not being sure about it yet and not having time to repair it when it broke. “Well… my father decided to invent me and put me to work keeping an eye on his death candles. I didn’t really do much but remove those that went out and put up new ones. A task that never ended with the amount of people dying. A work that exponentially would get harder…”
He had stopped talking as he also had stopped moving. His eyes focused on the crossbow as talking about it brought up memories.
“I was there alone for two-thousand years or something… Then people started to mess… and… a lot happened…” He took a deep breath, looking up at her, giving her a big smile as he shook his head. “Long story short, I made big ‘ol pops mad and he banished me to what he called another universe.”
As he talked, Emma stayed silent, listening to what he had gone through. As he seemed to finish up, she thought to compliment him. “You don’t look like you’re two-thousand years old.”
That was indeed true. He looked like he was somewhere in his twenties. “I’m physically twenty-one years old. Ever since I left that prison of a job, I have started to age. Mentally I’m… not sure. I might be old but I have basically no experiences in anything.”
That seemed odd and rather conflicting with what she had seen. His map was indeed the work of a toddler and his bag rather badly made but functional. What he seemed to be good at was making horrible tasting bread and making jerky. “What about the food? The clothes? You are great at hunting, baking a sewing.”
“Hah… if only. I can’t do any of those things. Believe it or not but somehow… I don’t know how… but somehow these items appear at the start of the week at the same spot near my house. At first I didn’t trust it but a person can get desperate fast without food. I took it in, ate, got different clothes and before I knew it, the week was over and there were new supplies. I never managed to catch the person that helped me.”
Lucas looked up at the sky and then back at her. He realized tat he had been talking for too long. He shook his head, grabbing his bag and the tent, putting it onto his back. “It’s time. Get up.” He didn’t sound so friendly when he said this.
Lilly didn’t like that they had to move already but she knew that the longer she waited, the further she would be behind. She too grabbed her bag and started to walk. Due to Emma being with Lucas when he started to walk, she was already a bit more ahead and waited for Emma to catch up before starting to walk again.
The further they walked, the more bushes that started to show up. At first the forest didn’t have many bushes seeing as they left his home but now that they were getting closer to the river again, he started to get aware of something. The sound of leaves cracking below their feet. While walking, he would look behind himself towards the girls who were a bit behind him, enough for them to be able to quietly talk and him to not hear them.
As he looked at the path they had walked, he only got more worried. His attention was directed to the girls as they started to chuckle and point at him. Before he could ask why they were laughing, a sharp pain went through his head. Due to looking behind him, he had walked full on against a tree. He fell down, cursing and holding his head. The pain caused him to see black spots. The girls only started to laugh loudly.
Keeping a hand against his head, he would get mad as he got up and turned to look at that. “Shut up!”
Lilly now had caught up with him as she would just chuckle and started to copy him with her hand against her head.
Lucas grunted as he gestured to the trail they had left.* “If you haven’t noticed it yet, we’re leaving behind a rather obvious trail. We should pick up the pace.”
Both of the girls turned around. They didn’t seem as worried which wasn’t a surprise to Lucas. Emma shrugged as she looked back at Lucas. “Like someone is going to follow us.”
“How can you both be so… oblivious? You are actively being hunted! I’m surprised that they haven’t found us yet.”
Emma started to tap the ground with her feet, seemingly getting nervous. “What do you mean surprised that they haven’t found us yet?”
“Simple, you two were being hunted. One of your horses fell down the ravine while the other kept going. If they captured the horse that kept going, then they would’ve found nobody. What I would do then is go back to where the other horse fell down. Then again they’ll notice that nobody was dead. That means that they’ll be looking around as you couldn’t have gone far. Eventually they’ll find my home and from there on they’ll be able to track us. We have to continue our path and fast.” He turned around and started to jog.
As he was jogging, the weight of the tent and backpack was getting to his head literally. He started to feel his brain move or at least he imagined that that was how it felt.
Both Emma and Lily looked at each other as they saw him starting to run. “You have got to be kidding me!” Yelled Emma. Seeing as he didn’t answer or stop, they decided to run after him, Lily obviously having more trouble. As he disappeared into a bush, they couldn’t see him anymore. The sounds of his steps sounding through the forest. Another sound started to be clear, the flowing of water. As they burst through the bush, they saw the river Lucas had been talking about.
Just before they fell in the river, Lucas stopped them, pulling them to the right. “Come… don’t fall in as we don’t have time to fish you out.” He started to run again, this time a bit faster. The girls barely had anything to carry while Lucas was carrying a bigger backpack and the tent.
After a while he stopped, throwing the items to build up a tent into the river, watching it sink. “Not worth it.” Was all he had to say about it.
As he threw it away, it started to dawn on both Emma and Lilly how serious he was about this. Being much lighter now, he was able to keep it up longer. He wasn’t good at pretty much anything but he did have good stamina.
A they ran like this for around half an hour, Lucas lost focus. The path they were following was very monotonous. To the left was the river with eh constant sound of flowing water with on either side of the river having a path big enough for two horses to walk side by side. Then besides that on both sides were bushes. Thanks to the water and the distance, they would thrive, growing big and dense.
Due to the never changing scenery and the constant sound, everything started to zoom past him, getting in some sort of trance. So when he was taken out by Emma by tapping his shoulder, he would stop, panting and looking at her.
Lilly was far behind them. She had completely stopped jogging and was just walking, panting and obviously out of breath. Even with he possible threat, he knew that he had to wait for her.
Actually happy with the break, he would plop down and lean against the backpack. Emma saw this and put her bag on the ground together with her bow, going back to help Lilly.
As she reached her, she took the bag and bow of Lilly, allowing her to move a bit faster. Once they got to him, they would drop the bag and sit down as well.
Lucas grabbed the bag that was just dropped and opened it u, grabbing some food and some water. He gave them all some dried jerky without bread as he started to drink, drinking exactly a third of the water flask as he then offered it to Emma. It tasted like leather and old but it was all they had.
“This is for the both of you so make sure to share.”
Emma took the leather bag and felt how much was still in it, shaking her head. “We need more water.”
This was met by Lucas with nothing but raised eyebrows and the sound of chewing. Emma let out a moan of desperation as she started to drink, actually keeping most for her sister. She wasn’t stupid and knew that Lilly needed it more than her.
As they sat there, the sun was getting lower and lower with the minute. Before the sun was able to easily reach them as it went down at the side of the ravine. Now after moving way from the ravine, things got darker faster.
Knowing that not much more travel would be done, he grabbed his bag and lie down, resting his head onto the bag. His eyes were focused on the water, looking as it was streaming by fast. As the sound of the rushing water got back into his head, he closed his eyes, imagining that he was swimming. Something he never learned to do or even knew what that looked like.
As the girls also went to lie down, it would slowly get darker. After a while of looking at waiting, Emma got up. Lucas lifted his head up to look at her. She shook her head, motioning for him to stay down. “I’m going to the toilet real quick.”
Lucas just nodded, lying back down and closing his eyes. Emma walked to the bush and slowly went through it, not liking the fact she had to walk through it, cutting her leg with a branch. “For Pan sakes.”
It also didn’t take long for her to burst back through the leaves. Lucas being prepared sat up fast, holding his dagger, ready to stab whoever it was. As soon as he saw her, he would lower his dagger, looking rather confused.
Emma put a finger up to her lips, motioning him to be silent. Lilly by now also sat up as she was confused as well. Emma would then gesture to behind her. “Someone is coming.”
Lucas got white as he slowly got onto his knees. Lilly followed his action as both grabbed their bags as well. “If this gets ugly, jump In the river. Things might get ugly. Don’t wait for me.”
By now the girls didn’t ask what for as the people Emma had seen were now close enough for their voices to be heard.
“…going back to the border then they need to go past here. Otherwise they would be going deeper into our territory. Even they wouldn’t be so dumb.” Said a man. He was fairly close but they couldn’t see him nor could he see the group trying to hide behind the row of bushes.
“Are you sure that those tracks weren’t from an animal? I mean, we’ve being going for a while now with not another sign of your stupid trail.” The other man sounded annoyed as he asked this. “Let’s just go back to the camp, today would be beef.”
That’s when the voices stopped. Both groups stayed quiet as the bush started to rustle.
“There’s tracks here. Someone was here recently.” The rustling of the leaves got louder as a man stuck his head through the bushes. His eyes locked with the group, both frozen for just a split second while processing what was seen.
Lucas was the first to react. He jumped up, leaving his bag on the ground as he swung with his knife towards the man.
The man pulled away, letting out a yell in fear as he was still surprised. “They’re there!”
Hitting nothing, Lucas would take a couple of steps back. “Go! Jump in the water! Let the river do their work!”
Emma got up first. She quickly moved to Lilly, grabbing her by her arm and forcing her with her, jumping into the water as they left their bags for what it was, leaving all the food.
A bit more to the right of Lucas came a centaur through the bushes. He saw the girls disappear and then saw Lucas. He had a bow in his hands which he quickly loaded with an arrow, aiming it at Lucas.
A cold hand wrapped around his heart as he saw the arrow going to his face. This wasn’t a naked girl casually threatening him. These were hunters out for blood. Adrenaline and fear took control. Without giving it a second thought, he would dive to the ground, feeling something fly right past him where he would’ve been if he didn’t move.
The second centaur came back through the bush as well. He grabbed his bag as he then jumped into the water. Everything was slowed down as he saw the water come closer faster. The cold liquid wrapping around him like a cold blanket. He didn’t know how to swim but his bag being mostly water proof held him up. As his head got back above the water, he could hear hooves.
As he looked to the right, he saw the centaur running past him. It was the one that had shot at him. He stopped to aim at Lucas, drawing the string back to shoot. Lucas instinctively raised his right arm, letting go of his bag to quickly pull his sleeve back, shooting his mini crossbow.